Chiang Kai-shek was murdered during Xi'an Incident: Japan option

[Paolo Giusti]

Good evening!
I am new on this site, so please do not ban me immediately if i make an error!

I am a long time lurker and i have just found courage to write a TL, but i would like to liste to your opinion about some possibile consequences of the POD.
So, no more talk!

If Chiang Kai-shek was shot by the plotters, what would Japan do?
The KMT is still commited more against the CCP than the Japanese: in fact, CKS was kidnapped because he refuse an opportunistic alliance with Mao.

I prefer to keep you in the dark about why CKS is killed, but if you think the reason is paramount, i will gladly give you some clues.

Thank you for answering!

EDIT for great, embarassing error.

 

[BigBlueBox]

What do you mean by shot? Do you mean that they just assassinate him instead of taking him hostage? Or that they capture him but then execute him due to a refusal to agree to the Second United Front?

 

[Paolo Giusti]

What do you mean by shot? Do you mean that they just assassinate him instead of taking him hostage? Or that they capture him but then execute him due to a refusal to agree to the Second United Front?

The second.

EDIT: more precisely, "they execute him due to a refusal to agree to the Second United Front" without ultimatum.

 

[BigBlueBox]

The second, the what if is that "he was shot by the plotters"

The Xi'an incident occurred in December 1936. The Marco Polo Incident was in July 1937. The result would probably be an intensification of the Chinese Civil War, and the Japanese would gladly sit back and watch as China tears itself apart, content that it poses no threat to Manchukuo.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

The Xi'an incident occurred in December 1936. The Marco Polo Incident was in July 1937. The result would probably be an intensification of the Chinese Civil War, and the Japanese would gladly sit back and watch as China tears itself apart, content that it poses no threat to Manchukuo.

Damn, you are right...my bad.
I EDIT the question immediately.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

Greetings everybody and thanks for your answers!
May i ask you to warrant your answer to give me/us suggestion?

 

[Paolo Giusti]

May I bump?

 

[Richard V]

It would be a perfect opportunity to invade as China would have a power vacuum. Which was why the Communists insisted the mutineers keep him alive.

There was also no reason Chiang would refuse. At worse he could renounce his agreement as soon as he was freed. It was just that it was in his interest to stick to the alliance.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

It would be a perfect opportunity to invade as China would have a power vacuum. Which was why the Communists insisted the mutineers keep him alive.

AFAIK, Mao wanted to kill him, it was Zhou Enali and then Stalin who saved CKS.

There was also no reason Chiang would refuse. At worse he could renounce his agreement as soon as he was freed. It was just that it was in his interest to stick to the alliance.

Indeed, that is why I had him killed

due to a refusal to agree to the Second United Front" without ultimatum.

 

[Richard V]

AFAIK, Mao wanted to kill him, it was Zhou Enali and then Stalin who saved CKS.

Only some junior officers wanted him dead. Neither Zhang, the warlord who kidnapped him, nor Mao and Zhou, or Moscow wanted CKS dead. The KMT would certainly intensify the civil war to avenge their leader. It would serve no purpose. If CKS refused to go along he would be a prisoner indefinitely and other KMT leaders would happily take his place.

https://arsfemina.de/agnes-smedley/smedley-»white-empress«-xian-incident-1936-1937

 

[Paolo Giusti]

Thanks @Richard V, but I am scared we have different secondary sources (https://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=242) and no primary ones.

IIRC GRU boss too favoured kill CKS and he was purged for that reason. I have an obiter about him in an Italian book about Pjatakov's flight in Norway, but I am scare you do not read Italian, do you?

 

[Richard V]

Thanks @Richard V, but I am scared we have different secondary sources (https://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=242) and no primary ones.

IIRC GRU boss too favoured kill CKS and he was purged for that reason. I have an obiter about him in an Italian book about Pjatakov's flight in Norway, but I am scare you do not read Italian, do you?

No I’m afraid I don’t read Italian. I can’t speak to whether the official reason given for a Soviet purge corresponds to real motives. It’s been twenty years since I did a paper on this so the source material is long forgotten, but the parties involved were acting rationally and coolly. CKS’s kidnapping was a huge opportunity for the Communists to change their fortunes. Killing him would squander that and they knew it.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

No I’m afraid I don’t read Italian. I can’t speak to whether the official reason given for a Soviet purge corresponds to real motives.

Actually, "Il volo di Pjatakov" cites Orlov and Whittaker's hearsay of Krivitsky. But I concur it warrants nothing, since we have no primary sources.

It’s been twenty years since I did a paper on this so the source material is long forgotten, but the parties involved were acting rationally and coolly. CKS’s kidnapping was a huge opportunity for the Communists to change their fortunes. Killing him would squander that and they knew it.

Indeed.

IOTL, "save him" was the best choice for CCP. ITTL no. Could you accept this precondition or you prefer I anticipate the reason CKS is killed of?

 

[Richard V]

Actually, "Il volo di Pjatakov" cites Orlov and Whittaker's hearsay of Krivitsky. But I concur it warrants nothing, since we have no primary sources.



Indeed.

IOTL, "save him" was the best choice for CCP. ITTL no. Could you accept this precondition or you prefer I anticipate the reason CKS is killed of?

I would say there’s no rational reason to do this. But blunders certainly can happen.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

I would say there’s no rational reason to do this. But blunders certainly can happen.

Ok.
It all start with Anti-Comintern negotiation: ITTL Neurath tries to steamroll Ribbentropp and proposes to extend the Pact to CKS. Hitler refuses, but NKVD discovers only Neurath's suggestion. Dead scared, Stalin prefers an anarchic China to an Anti-Comintern one and incites anti-japanese member of KMT against CKS.

 

[Richard V]

Ok.
It all start with Anti-Comintern negotiation: ITTL Neurath tries to steamroll Ribbentropp and proposes to extend the Pact to CKS. Hitler refuses, but NKVD discovers only Neurath's suggestion. Dead scared, Stalin prefers an anarchic China to an Anti-Comintern one and incites anti-japanese member of KMT against CKS.

Well that assumes the Chinese Communists followed Stalin’s orders which they did not and that Stalin fails to recognize the Japan-German alliance is the bigger threat to the Soviet Union than a hypothetical China-Germany alliance. The latter would be directed more at domestic Chinese Communists than at Moscow. There’s no question who the Japan-Germany pact is directed against. Anarchic China only strengthens Japan and gives them greater freedom of action.

It is funny to imagine Stalin laying awake at night worried about the threat from Chiang Kai-shek.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

and that Stalin fails to recognize the Japan-German alliance is the bigger threat to the Soviet Union than a hypothetical China-Germany alliance. The latter would be directed more at domestic Chinese Communists than at Moscow. There’s no question who the Japan-Germany pact is directed against.

Neurath proposes to extend the Pact to KMT, i.e. a Tokyo-Nanking-Berlin Pact. It is not a choice between Japan or China, but Japan and China: IMHO it would scare Stalin enough.

Well that assumes the Chinese Communists followed Stalin’s orders which they did not

Indeed.

Anarchic China only strengthens Japan and gives them greater freedom of action.

Maybe yes, maybe no: Japan never managed to occupy effectively China: after Ichi-Go, KMT was destroyed but CCP reinforced, since it transformed a conventional war in an asymmetric one, where Mao's CCP excels. Of course, Mao had to recognize then that occupation could be worse than a symmetrical fight.
Do you think this scenario is ASB?

 

[Richard V]

Neurath proposes to extend the Pact to KMT, i.e. a Tokyo-Nanking-Berlin Pact. It is not a choice between Japan or China, but Japan and China: IMHO it would scare Stalin enough.
...
Do you think this scenario is ASB?

The purpose of the Anti-Comintern Pact was for Germany and Japan to form an alliance, ostensibly against the Soviet Union because they can’t openly say they had a common enemy in the US as well. While China was hostile to Soviet support to their domestic Communists, it was in a state of extreme weakness while their one and only foreign enemy was Japan. So they will certainly not ally with their enemy and make another enemy with the Soviet Union. Stalin was geopolitically astute, so he was not likely to think CKS was about to join the pact based on an intelligence fragment and order his death because of it.

I wouldn’t say it’s ASB because as I said blunders can happen. But it would take Stalin making a bad decision and the Chinese Communists going along with it against their own interest, which was unlikely.

 

[Paolo Giusti]

. But it would take Stalin making a bad decision

Like deem Hitler too rational to start a second front .
Thank you for your plausability check!

 

[David T]

I think the real risk would be the formation of a pro-Japanese government of China. An old post of mine:

****

The best POD for a pro-Japanese government of China would be for Chiang Kai-shek to be killed during the Xi'an Incident--which came close to happening:

"Just before the attack at Lintong, Zhuang Xueliang had cabled Mao that he was about to act. Mao told his secretary, 'There will be good news in the morning.' At noon the next day a radioman rushed into Mao's cave and handed him an urgent message from Zhang Xueliang. One by one the CCP leaders hurried into the leader's primitive headquarters to hear the news. When Mao read out the news, the cave echoed with excited laughter and gleeful voices. Zhu De, Zhang Guotao, and others wanted to see Chiang and his fellow KMT generals killed immediately. Mao, 'laughing like mad,' felt the same way. Nonetheless, he immediately sought guidance from Moscow, proposing that Chiang be delivered for trial by 'the people.' Then the Chairman sent obsequious messages to the Young Marshal, calling him the 'national leader in resisting Japan,' extolling his 'world-shaking moves,' and hinting that he should deal with Chiang 'resolutely.'

"News of the kidnapping reached Moscow a few hours later, but unlike Mao, Stalin did not laugh; instead, he immediately saw that the event could be disastrous for the Soviet Union. The next day the Comintern received Chen Lifu's message and very likely read reports that He Yingqin had ordered Central Army divisions--probably the elite units--to move toward Xi'an and also had urged Wang Jingwei to rush home [from Europe--where incidentally he met with Hitler and discussed China joining the Anti-Comintern Pact-- DT]. The possibility suddenly loomed that the Generalissimo would be killed and Wang and He would establish a pro-Japanese government. Stalin sent a flash message to Mao telling him in no uncertain terms that the Soviet Union disapproved of the 'plot'--and suggesting that it was being staged by the Japanese. He ordered Mao to hold friendly talks with Chiang, find a peaceful solution, and release the KMT leader. In response to Stalin's orders, on December 15 a public telegram signed by Mao, Zhou [Enlai], and Zhu announced that the CCP stood for a peaceful solution of the 'Xi'an incident' and that any hasty moves would 'only delight the Japanese.'..." https://books.google.com/books?id=DUg2KGMQWHQC&pg=PA129

***

I would add to that post that Yes, of course a pro-Japanese government headed by Wang and He would be unpopular. But its opposition would be split between the CCP and various factions of the GMD, so it might not be that easy to overthrow...